We spend the hour on the controversy around the proposed construction of an Islamic community center in Lower Manhattan, which has turned into a national issue. Opposition to the center first started among fringe, right-wing blogs but has swept into the mainstream, with some Democrats, including Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, coming out against it. Republicans have vowed to make the controversy a campaign issue in the fall. We host a...

Debate is intensifying over the planned construction of an Islamic center and mosque two blocks from New York’s Ground Zero. But it is not just a local issue. Across the country, Muslim groups are facing attacks over plans to build new mosques. We speak to Daisy Khan of the American Society for Muslim Advancement, one of the main organizations behind the mosque project, and the wife of Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf; and Stephan Salisbury,...

As the media focuses on the fact that the suspect in the failed Times Square bomb plot is a Pakistani Muslim, what about the man who first noticed the smoke rising from the SUV? A street vendor, a Muslim immigrant from Senegal, says he first sounded the alarm and helped stop the plot. [includes rush transcript]

Syed Fahad Hashmi has been held in twenty-three-hour-a-day solitary confinement for nearly three years. The government’s case rested on the testimony and actions of an old acquaintance of Hashmi’s who turned government informant after his own arrest. The thirty-year-old American citizen’s trial was due to begin today in New York, but on Tuesday Hashmi pleaded guilty to one count of material support to a foreign terrorist...

We speak with leading Muslim scholar Tariq Ramadan, who was banned from entering the United States for six years. In 2004, Ramadan had accepted a job to become a tenured professor at the University of Notre Dame, but nine days before he was set to arrive, the Bush administration revoked his visa, invoking a provision of the PATRIOT Act. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton lifted the travel ban earlier this year. This week, he arrived in New...

The Justice Department is probing the killing of Detroit-area Islamic cleric Imam Luqman Ameen Abdullah, who was shot dead during an FBI raid shortly after being indicted on charges of conspiracy to commit federal crimes. The FBI said Abdullah was shot after he opened fire, but critics say he may have been targeted for assassination. We speak to Dawud Walid, executive director of the Michigan chapter of the Council on American-Islamic...

As US and NATO forces are preparing to launch a major military offensive in the Afghan city of Kandahar this June, we speak with Wadah Khanfar, the Director General of Al Jazeera. "Bombing and killing will always increase the anger and frustration against the Americans, and it will always be in favor of the Taliban," says Khanfar. We also look at the US military’s history of targeting Al Jazeera’s reporters, including...

Debbie Almontaser has won a victory in her battle against discrimination. She was the founding principal of the first Arabic-language public school in the United States, until a campaign of hate forced her out.

The federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has ruled the New York City Department of Education discriminated against the founding principal of an Arabic-language school in Brooklyn by forcing her to resign in 2007. In a non-binding ruling, the commission said the city had discriminated against the principal, Debbie Almontaser, “on account of her race, religion and national origin.” We speak with Almontaser and her attorney, Alan...

Federal prosecutors have moved to seize four mosques and a New York skyscraper belonging to a non-profit foundation with alleged financial ties to Iran. The Council on American-Islamic Relations warns that the seizure of places of worship may have First Amendment implications for the American Muslim community. [includes rush transcript]

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